Victor Hugo Quotes

Man does not understand nor accept immortality except on condition of self-remembrance.

Take all reasonable advantage of that which the present may offer you. It is the only time which is ours. Yesterday is buried forever, and to-morrow we may never see.

Death belongs to God alone; by what right do men touch that unknown thing?

Freedom in art, freedom in society, this is the double goal towards which all consistent and logical minds must strive.

It is from books that wise men derive consolation in the troubles of life.

It seems as though, at the approach of a certain dark hour, the light of heaven infills those who are leaving the light of earth.

Wide horizons lead the soul to broad ideas; circumscribed horizons engender narrow ideas; this sometimes condemns great hearts to become small minded.Broad ideas hated by narrow ideas,-this is the very struggle of progress.

The first symptom of true love in a man is timidity, in a young woman, boldness. This is surprising, and yet nothing is more simple. It is the two sexes tending to approach each other and assuming each the other's qualities.

Despots play their part in the works of thinkers. Fettered words are terrible words. The writer doubles and trebles the power of his writing when a ruler imposes silence on the people. Something emerges from that enforced silence, a mysterious fullness which filters through and becomes steely in the thought.

Diamonds are found only in the dark bowels of the earth; truths are found only in the depths of thought. It seemed to him that after descending into those depths after long groping in the blackest of this darkness, he had at last found one of these diamonds, one of these truths, and that he held it in his hand; and it blinded him to look at it. (pg. 231)

Symmetry is ennui, and ennui is the very essence of grief and melancholy. Despair yawns.

The soul does not give itself up to despair until it has exhausted all illusions.

Emotion is always new.

There is one thing stronger than all the armies in the world, and that is an idea whose time as come.

There is no vacuum in the human heart. Certain demolitions take place, and it is well that they do, but on condition that they are followed by reconstructions.

What says the law? You will not kill. How does it say it? By killing!

Let us sacrifice one day to gain perhaps a whole life.

There is no supernatural, there is only nature. Nature alone exists and contains all. All is. There is the part of nature that we perceive, and the part of nature that we do not perceive. ... If you abandon these facts, beware; charlatans will light upon them, also the imbecile. There is no mean: science, or ignorance. If science does not want these facts, ignorance will take them up. You have refused to enlarge human intelligence, you augment human stupidity. When Laplace withdraws Cagliostro appears.

Strong and rare natures are thus created; misery, almost always a stepmother, is sometimes a mother; privation gives birth to power of soul and mind; distress is the nurse of self-respect; misfortune is a good breast for great souls.

Jean Prouvaire was timid only in repose. Once excited, he burst forth, a sort of mirth accentuated his enthusiasm, and he was at once both laughing and lyric.

One can no more keep the mind from returning to an idea than the sea from returning to a shore. For a sailor, this is called the tide; in the case of the guilty it is called remorse. God stirs up the soul as well as the ocean.

If you look in the eyes of the young, you see flame. If you look in the eyes of the old, you see light.

God has bestowed two gifts on man: hope and ignorance. Ignorance is the better of the two.

Profound hearts, wise minds, take life as God makes it; it is a long trial, and unintelligible preparation for the unknown destiny.

Each of our passions, even love, has a stomach that must not be overloaded. We must in everything write the word 'finis' in time; we must restrain ourselves, when it becomes urgent; we must draw the bolt on the appetite, play a fantasia on the violin, then break the strings with our own hand. The Wise man is he who knows when and how to stop.

To be perfectly happy it does not suffice to possess happiness, it is necessary to have deserved it.

There is no such thing as a little country. The greatness of a people is no more determined by their numbers than the greatness of a man is by his height.

by making himself a priest made himself a demon.

The most ferocious animals are disarmed by caresses to their young.

God created the flirt as soon as he made the fool.

There must be people who pray even for those who never pray.

Youth, even in its sorrows, always has a brilliancy of its own.

Life is a flower of which love is honey.

Hope is a delusion; no hand can grasp a wave or a shadow.

Happiness lies for those who cry, those who hurt, those who have searched, and those who have tried for only they can appreciate the importance of people who have touched their lives.

What a grand thing, to be loved! What a grander thing still, to love!

If he had had all Peru in his pocket, he would certainly have given it to this dancer; but Gringoire had not Peru in his pocket; and besides, America was not yet discovered. (p. 66)

...mothers are often fondest of the child which has caused them the greatest pain.

That is to be two and to be but one. A man and a woman mingled into one angel. It is heaven.

There comes an hour when protest no longer suffices; after philosophy there must be action; the strong hand finishes what the idea has sketched.

God manifests himself to us in the first degree through the life of the universe, and in the second degree through the thought of man. The second manifestation is not less holy than the first. The first is named Nature, the second is named Art.

Houses are like the human beings that inhabit them.

If God had intended that man should go backward, he would have given him eyes in the back of his head.

The world of sleep has an existence of its own.

Press on! A better fate awaits thee.

A man trying to escape never thinks himself sufficiently concealed.

We say and exclaim within ourselves without breaking silence, in a tumult where everything speaks except our mouths. The realities of the soul are none the less real for being invisible and impalpable.

Every bird which flies has the thread of the infinite in its claw.